Jean Béliveau Trophy a special award for Habs’ Subban and his family

Karl Subban still remembers the first time his son, P.K., met Jean Béliveau.

P.K. was 10 years old, playing minor hockey in Toronto at the Canlan Ice Sports complex at York University. Béliveau was at the arena and gave a pregame speech to P.K. and his teammates.

“We didn’t have a great team,” Karl recalled. “But you know what? They played that game like I’d never seen them play before. We were up 4-0 after a short time in the game. That’s the power of the man and the brilliance of the man. He sat there with me (during the game) and he would always say: ‘Karl’. And this is Mr. Béliveau calling me Karl! Telling me stories.”

After Béliveau died on Dec. 2, 2014 following a battle with cancer, P.K. sent out this tweet:

I met Jean Béliveau when I was 10 years old..That's when I knew I wanted to play for the @CanadiensMTL -A Hero and Hockey's Captain #RIP

So when Subban received the Jean Béliveau Trophy before last Thursday’s 3-2 win over the Buffalo Sabres at the Bell Centre it was a special moment for the entire Subban family. The award is presented annually to a Canadiens player for his charitable actions and community involvement.

“Mr. Beliveau was his idol,” Karl said. “If there’s one award I want him to win, it’s that —along with the Stanley Cup.”

Thursday’s game had a scary ending for the Subban family when P.K. was taken off the ice on a stretcher late in the third period after suffering what turned out to be a non-serious neck injury in a collision with teammate Alexei Emelin. Karl and his wife, Maria, were out of the country at the time and were asleep when one of their daughters called to tell them about P.K.’s injury.

“She said: ‘Daddy did you see what happened to P.K.?'” Karl recalled during a phone interview Friday night. “I said: ‘What do you mean what happened to P.K.?’ And she said that he was taken off the ice on a stretcher. So right away panic sets in. It wasn’t long after that Newport Sports (the agency founded by P.K.’s agent, Don Meehan) called.

“They put us at ease just a bit,” Karl added. “But as time went on we got more information and we sort of brought down the temperature and the worry we had. It wasn’t a good night, but it ended up pretty good because we know that he’ll be fine.”

P.K. missed his first NHL game due to injury Saturday night when the Canadiens lost 4-1 to the Minnesota Wild at the Bell Centre. It ended his team-leading iron-man streak of playing in 274 consecutive games.

Subban was at Saturday’s game and looked good — and dapper, as always — walking out of the Bell Centre afterwards along with a few other injured teammates. Coach Michel Therrien said during his post-game news conference that he didn’t have any timeline for P.K.’s return.

“I know he’s only day to day,” the coach said.

The Canadiens had the day off on Sunday and practise at 11 a.m. Monday at the Bell Centre at which time there should be an update on P.K.’s condition. The Canadiens are back in action Tuesday night when the Florida Panthers visit the Bell Centre (7:30 p.m., SNE, RDS, TSN Radio 690).

Last September, P.K. made a $10-million pledge over a seven-year period to the Montreal Children’s Hospital Foundation. At the time, P.K. said: “I am proud to walk in the footsteps of my idol Jean Béliveau by giving back to the community and feel privileged to be able to help transform the lives of sick children and their families.”

Karl still has a photo that was taken of him and Béliveau together during P.K.’s game as a 10-year-old at the Canlan Ice Sports complex.

“I’ve always said next to the wedding pictures I’ve taken with my wife, I’ve never looked so great as standing there with him,” Karl said. “He was such a great man and a powerful man.”

When asked what it was like to learn that his son would receive the Jean Béliveau Trophy, Karl simply said: “Wow!”

“As a parent, I know that there’s no way he could have done what he’s done all by himself,” Karl added. “And I know Maria joins me in saying this. We’re just thankful of the team of people around him, from the Canadiens and all the people he has in his team who are working with him to help him, to support him, to lead him, to guide him, and I’m so thankful for that.

“I never fail to thank the Canadiens for drafting him and giving him that opportunity to live his dream,” the father added. “Because I’ve always said that you just never know what you’re capable of accomplishing with a dream, and we’re seeing it playing out there. But I thank his teammates and Mr. Molson and the entire management team of Montreal for giving him that opportunity not only to live his hockey dream, but also to help his community.

“I said to P.K., (Béliveau) won so many Stanley Cups, but so many people talk about the great man that he was and what a lesson for P.K. When your career is done — and hopefully he will win Stanley Cups in Montreal — but for me as a dad, if they can talk about the quality person that he was? Wow! That would put a big smile on my face.”

Morning all! As to your comments PK, Paz, Cal, Timo, Marvin20, HIB and so many more, yes, the HI/O community definitely have limited reason to come on here and cheer. Most have gone through the 7 stages of grief that started at the end of November. My own mourning period began when we lost to NJ in OT. I saw it happening in real time. Condon’s promising efforts was coming apart. One or two easy and early goal was going in and the Habs were having trouble scoring. Of course, the posi-trolls heaped on and did everything including name calling to question my “Fan” status. Well, not even I expected such a horrible performance in December/January/February until they started playing around .500 hockey.

So here we sit, with all of the warts being exposed about this team and the coaching staff and most have lost and confidence in the GM and certainly Coach Empty who inexplicably still chortles and guffaws at his pressers as if he is secure in his position for years to come despite his numerous flaws and shortcomings.

So now, I and many others who are lifelong Hab fans and supporters have shifted into acceptance and not just a little dismay and disinterest because of the lack of any movement and clear disingenuous, obfuscation and hypocrisy of this regime which has turned out to be close to the distastefullness of the Ghost years. THAT to me, is probably most upsetting because I like most fans of the Habs fans had high hopes when Bergevin was hired, but not so much when he brought in Coach Empty.

So here we sit. No playoffs. No plans. Loads of fourth liners who can’t score. Lot’s of concern about player development, a depleted and limited farm team that has as poor a coaching staff if not worse on the farm, possible problems in the room and out of the room, seriously poor trade performance in this years crop from Semin, Kassian and ten trading away 2/3 of the best performing line during the early days of this season in Fleishmann and Weise, poor to very poor management of the assets and identifying the talent for scoring, a highly questionable and suspect trade with Arizona for John Scott and now Jack Todd will take up the excuses that the injuries can’t be ignored, primarily to Carey Price who may ever play the same because of the recurring injuries.

At the same time, there is no excuse for playing .250 hockey because you lose your Vezina level goaltender. That has also been well documented with teams like Minnesota last year, Ottawa, Rangers, etc… So what possibly could have happened? Injuries according to Todd? Poppycock! It was all of the problems and more that I listed above and that some on here still refuse to accept, primarily with the putrid PP, lack of commitment or perhaps even skill from Plex, Max and then the talent pool drops off (Chucky gets a pass for his poor performance during the step slide as he wasn’t deployed in my mind, properly) and now we get to look at DSP performing well with NJ, which I believe will level out to his mean of perhaps 15 goals and 15 assists over a season, but we shall see.

So what happens this summer is all we have to look at and the draft of course. Will Bargain Bergy trade up his position? Will he draft a big forward or center like McLeod or Gauthier, or will he stick to his program and draft a defenseman and dash our hopes that talented players like Chucky will have a linemate or second line to support his skill level. Beyond looking at the deployment in the next 13 games of the young AHL’ers (only because of the NOW many injuries), there isn’t much to consider since the Habs won’t drop much lower than 9 or 10th in the draft.

Other than that, the sad, disheartening season may well remind Molson, just how focused he and his Habs staff must be on winning the Cup, not sneaking into the Playoffs. For most of us, there isn’t any other objective. For those that believes anything can happen if you sneak into the Playoffs, not against LA, Anaheim, Chicago, San Jose, St. Louis and others if the Habs continue to deploy players that are 5’10” and under with similar skill to those who stand 6’2″ or higher and 30 pounds plus or heavier, including the coaching issues, pipeline of talent issues, etc…

So does the future look bright at this point? Not to me and yes, I can be somewhat pessimistic as most of you know, but over this year, I’ve learned that the glory years of the Habs are long gone and my privilege to watch the 1970’s Canadiens will never be repeated here, despite the success of the current Chicago franchise. The hamstringing this team has to deal with paying Canadien dollars, Quebec taxes, the need for a French speaking Coach are just adding more stones on the chest of the the Habs organization. I’ll still watch and hope for a win from time to time, but I’ve been relegated to affirm to all the Rangers fans that poke fun at me about being a Habs fan, that it was a once proud franchise that is one of the richest with the most substantial history and like the once great British empire, I will still be able to watch videos and read about legends like Beliveau, The Rocket, Robinson, Lafleur and so many others, none from the period after 1993 when we traded away our last superstar in Patrick Roy.

Have a great summer guys. I have to work off the 15 pounds I put on during this short and depressingly warm winter that we had. No expectations for the summer trading season and the pedantic attitude of Bargain Bergy, but I still hope… as we all do, positive troll or negative. We are all Habs fans dealing with some PTSD from this season!

As someone else pointed out, Smith Pelly went on a hot streak during the playoffs with the Ducks and now is getting more minutes in a different role in NJ. I’ll reserve judgment. Matteau and Danault fill important roles on the Canadiens. A role that was missing with Desharnais’ absence. If you don’t know what that is, you don’t know your team and you really don’t understand where they play.

When everyone’s thinking the same … it’s likely no one’s thinking at all.

I know where they play and where DD has been mis-deployed and if neither was in the line-up, it wouldn’t make a scratch of difference. Matteau has shown nothing since coming on and it’s not enough time to evaluate. Danault has shown face-off skills, otherwise nothing else in a short audition time. Too many fourth liner projects and limited true up-front talent that would be deployed properly, like up and down the line-up, constant line shifting, stapling to the bench after one mistake and I can go on, but Coach Empty’s idiocy has been well documented by this forum, the media and commentators. There is not much left to talk about since Empty is still the coach and DD’s injury is the only reason Chucky got more time and others got deployment. Why Eller is still on the wing, I don’t get either, but I can go on and just used up to many words on the next posting…

Eller is on the wing now because they want to look at Mccarron at centre on the BIG club. Eller is a solid THIRD line centre. Nothing more.
Just like Mitchell being punted over to RW – Danault has taken over his spot there. they want to get a look because they already know what Eller and Mitchell can do at centre.
Matteau – sorry but I have to agree with some posts – he has done NOTHING yet. DSP did NOTHING great either except leaving us wanting more every night. HE did ok and did ok in playoffs too by finishing his checks (he plays a heavy game)….but not much offence….so when you are inconsistent like DSP was – you are expendable.

The hand-wringing about Smith-Pelly may be a bit pre-mature. Good for him now but unless the current goal and point streak are replicated long term and indicate a level of skill not evident in his time in Montreal, it is too early to make a judgement on the trade.

He appears to be playing top minutes due to personnel issues in NJ and I am guessing his points are not due to superior skill (haven’t seen them) but fortune.

It is relatively quiet on HIO but there is the Draft and the off-season.
Being hockey fans, I expect that many will follow bits and pieces of the playoffs… A good match-up or two, especially as we get into the Conference finals and SCF.
Otherwise, Habsland is coming to a close, real soon.

Hiya PK. Like you and many here, I’m a huge hockey fan. To me there is nothing in sports more entertaining then playoff hockey. That saud, once the Habs get eliminated and the playoffs drag into June I begin the agree with those who argue the dang season is too long.

Bergevin felt pressured to make room for McCarron and other prospects with the SmithPelly trade. DSP isn´t a sniper but his goals scored per minutes played is quite good, he could get 12-15 a year and he is a big physical, young forward.
Additionally, he didn´t seem to be fazed by the pressure and media attention, which is difficult for a young player here and blended in very well with the team
Could turn out to be a big lack of judgement on this one by both MB and MT
There is a bumber crop of prospects about to mature and though I am not an MT hater, I have my doubts about his ability to get the most out of those young kids. Yes, Subban, Beaulieu, Galchenyuk, Gallagher have all done under his watch well but they were all very obviously talented players. The maturing crop does not have a veritable blue-chipper, but there are players in thaty group who will blossom into decent NHLers with work and patience. MT seems to demote, sit, or change up his third and fourth liners if they have 3 inconspicuous games in a row; that approach will not work generally speaking with this group.

Smith Pelly started winning me over this year. I liked his quickness relative to last season.

Then there was that FIRST game after Gallagher went down. Smith Pelly was played top 6 right wing and scored 2 goals. But the next few games he didn’t score.

And now we get back to Therrien / Bergevin – I include Bergevin because he hired this coach, extended him, and protects him, so no way he doesn’t agree with him and support him.

Therrien stated publicly that Galchenyuk was moved away from Pacioretty because he went “three games” without a “scoring chance”, and that proved to the coach that Galchenyuk was not yet ready for that assignment.

3 games is not nearly enough to draw that kind of conclusion UNLESS that’s the conclusion you have already come to, and the only one you expect.

Therrien’s biggest weakness, and there are too many to discuss here, is that he has preconceived notions about players, and frankly, his ability to judge talent is one of the poorest I have ever seen from an NHL coach. There are 30 coaches in the NHL, and I believe that in judging talent Therrien is very close to the bottom, if not the worst of the 30. Someone has to be last, the coaches are not equal in judging talent.

So Smith Pelly was relegated back to 3rd and then 4th line duty. The player became discouraged. He felt, justifiably, that he had shown some promise and deserved more time to play more minutes.

I’m not going to predict how Smith Pelly will do going forward. I saw a lot of talent in Sekac, as did Bergevin most certainly when he signed him and kept him, but the player’s ability to work with NHL coaches is ruining his career I think. Maybe it’s the same with Smith Pelly, I don’t know.

But I do agree that Therrien never saw Smith Pelly as a top 6 player, and therefore, was too quick to pigeon hole the player into a 4th line position in the lineup.

I remember well how Bergevin described Smith Pelly as a “long term project”. So is that how a player should be treated if he’s really a long term project?? When a “long term project” gets a chance to move up in the lineup because of an injury, and then produces in his first game, usually you give him 10 or more games there to show what he can do. 3 games is a joke. It’s just not NHL.

He´s the kind of player that pucks bounce in off of. You need those players, especially in the playoffs. Getting him for Sekac was actually a very good move when most on here lambasted him. Giving him away (for Matteau) negates that shrewd move. People said he didn´t have as much upside as Sekac; I believe DSP has quite a bit of uspide, in fact, and his size will never impede his development the way it will with a few of our smallish current prospects.
I too recall the game he scored 2 goals playing with Pacioretty; It got me pretty excited at the time.
I mean, even 6 goals in 47 games, playing mostly with different fourth liners, around ten minutes a night, is no mean feat. He also wasn´t himself for a while after coming back from an injury, he was playing quite well prior to that. It should have raised an eyebrow with management.

After having witnessed Minny applying one of the 9 or 10 remaining nails on this season’s Habs coffin, I’m not too surprised to find HIO empty. Only 4 weeks and 13 games left.
The only thing left now is how low the team finishes and whether or not the Habs get a top 3 pick.
Jettisoning the coaching staff by use of an ejector seat in Geoff Molson’s limo may be the last resort for the Habs’ hoodwinked owner.

No surprise that HiO is as empty as an MT motivational speech. This edition of the Habs is going nowhere. Not enough skill up front and even less behind the bench.

I get that he’s currently working with an AHL squad so my expectations are tempered accordingly. But my concern is that the system employed by this coach and his deployment/development of youth are indefensible. Worse, the way he “prepares” the kids means he won’t ever be in a position to trust them if he needs them in the post season. That’s why they can’t get it done in the playoffs. To me, those are reasons enough for a coaching upgrade.

The problem though, is that the injuries gives the “no excuses” coach all the excuses he needs to ensure a full return for he and his crew. In fact, I fully expect that a healthy Habs squad will perform to expectations next year, completely solidifying MT’s job until at least, the end of next season.

In no way do I want this player back but… Smith-Pelly has five points in five games since being traded…3 goals, 2 assists… What the what!?! Lol… if he goes to be even somewhat productive it reinforces that Therrien’s coaching style kills young players.

ya right, but I bet you would take back Golden Boy in a second, I miss local folk hero Sekac…but as far as DSP go’s who would want a player with size, plays physical, and can score playing in Montreal….of coarse you don’t want him back….all Smurfs all the time

I had to look that word up …I did reply last night but for some reason the rest of the thread disappeared..I took no issue with your boyish humor..just to set the record straight..I thought it was kinda cute..